Pokljuka BMW IBU Biathlon World Championship 12.02.2021 10km Sprint race preview

Today’s sprint race simulation predicts biathletes from Norway as most likely winners of the Sprint race of the IBU World Championship 2021 in Pokljuka.

Johannes Thingnes Boe is unsurprisingly our model’s main favourite for today’s race and he is also the favourite to win both the 2020-21 overall biathlon world cup as well as the smaller globe for the sprint cup in our season simulation.

Sturla Holm Lægreid, Tarjei Boe, Johannes Dale are estimated to have a tight battle. Our model estimates Sturla Holm Laegreid’s winning chances at around six percent, Tarjei Boe’s at some eight percent and Johannes Dale’s at about seven percent.

Quentin Fillon Maillet, the silver medalist in the sprint event during last year’s world championship in Antholz (Italy), is projected to have decent medal chances this year too. Our model indicates about a 17 percent chance for him to get a medal. He is predicted to finish on average some 38 seconds behind Johannes Thingnes Boe.

Another athlete from France, Emilien Jacquelin has an estimated winning chance of four percent and 15 percent chance for picking up a medal.

Arnd Peiffer, the current Winter Olympic champion in the sprint discipline is projected just behind the two Frenchmen, Quentin and Emilien. Peiffer has some two percent chance of winning and ten percent chance to get on the podium. Another German athlete, Benedikt Doll has approximately the same ten percent to get a medal, but his chances of winning are slightly less – three percent.

Last year’s world champion in the sprint discipline, Alexander Loginov is predicted to have about a two percent chance of defending his title and nine percent chance to win a medal.

The Swedes also have solid prospects with Martin Ponsiluoma and Sebastian Samuelsson. Five percent chance to win for Martin and three percent chance to win for Sebastian.

Jakov Fak, is the Slovenian athlete most likely to excite the home fans, even if there will not be any fans in the stands due to the Covid-19 pandemic. He has some one percent chance to win and six percent chance to grab a medal.

Bib	Name	Winning chance	Chance for a medal	Projected seconds behind
28	BOE Johannes Thingnes	41%	67%	0s
9	LAEGREID Sturla Holm	6%	23%	28s
13	BOE Tarjei	8%	26%	32s
59	DALE Johannes	7%	24%	33s
16	FILLON MAILLET Quentin	5%	17%	38s
33	JACQUELIN Emilien	4%	15%	41s
18	PEIFFER Arnd	2%	10%	46s
6	PONSILUOMA Martin	5%	16%	47s
12	LOGINOV Alexander	2%	9%	52s
26	SAMUELSSON Sebastian	3%	11%	54s
31	DOLL Benedikt	3%	10%	56s
23	FAK Jakov	1%	6%	57s
62	DESTHIEUX Simon	2%	7%	58s
2	HOFER Lukas	2%	8%	59s
41	LESSER Erik	1%	5%	62s
11	WEGER Benjamin	1%	3%	70s
35	CLAUDE Fabien	1%	4%	70s
89	GUIGONNAT Antonin	1%	3%	70s
20	EDER Simon	<1%	2%	71s
22	NELIN Jesper	1%	3%	73s
4	ELISEEV Matvey	<1%	3%	74s
50	LATYPOV Eduard	1%	3%	76s
21	RASTORGUJEVS Andrejs	<1%	2%	79s
46	PIDRUCHNYI Dmytro	<1%	2%	80s
66	SMOLSKI Anton	<1%	2%	80s
52	KRCMAR Michal	<1%	1%	81s
78	EBERHARD Julian	1%	3%	81s
70	KUEHN Johannes	<1%	2%	83s
36	BOCHARNIKOV Sergey	<1%	1%	84s
10	WINDISCH Dominik	<1%	1%	89s